Affirmations for Aparigraha/Non-grasping:
At nine years old, Jaya decided she wanted to move her bedroom into the basement. This was a huge separation for me. For years and years, she would only fall asleep with me next to her. I felt like she had finally just started to sleep on her own, and now, so suddenly, she was going to be a whole floor away from me. My relationship with Jaya is the most challenging “possession” with which I practice non-grasping/nonattachment.
Her old bedroom became an overflow room with all her stuffies, dolls, and toys, her old tea set, and a million little pieces and parts of things that all had some memory associated with it. In August we tackled that room. We had four piles: Keep, Give Away, Throw Away and Sell. We sold a keyboard on Craigslist, and put the cash in a savings jar for the acting troupe she’s considering for middle school. Jaya is still attached to her dolls and tea set, which we kept. Many other things went to Goodwill; we recycled many scribbled-up notebooks. We organized markers, pencils, crayons, etc. There were many toys she played with during the process, and it was like a last hurrah before the final letting go. It felt like a ritual, which in the end was what we both needed for this rite of passage to feel complete.
Here are my affirmations for Aparigraha/Non-Grasping:
I let go of my attachments and my identification with material things with the practice of ritual.
I am not my things. I am not my ideas, my beliefs, my career or my relationships. I let go of what isn’t serving me, or what might serve others more than me, with ease.
I acknowledge abundance and I practice gratitude. When I feel gratitude for what I have, I don’t need more of anything. I feel fulfilled with what I have in this moment.
